Me, 2 kids and sometimes a husband (!) living in Firenze, Italy. What we love here and what we don't! Must sees, must haves and more besides. Hopefully you will see our love and enthusiasm for this beautiful city.

Monday, 30 April 2007

This very serious young man is now 12 years old! Where the last 12 years have gone I don't know! We have moved several times, which has involved him changing school and now we are here in Italy.

The fantastic bike you see was not only his birthday present but compensation for not going back to the UK to school! Yes, he wanted to go as that is where all his mates are and he really wants to board - who didn't when they were 12? Anyway, he goes back for definite in September, so hopefully we will have visits by his mates during that time.

The tortoise finally made good its escape. The owner of the garden we live in told us they are wild, so when it finally disappeared we didn't look too hard for it! However our first fireflies have appeared along with the bats, woodpeckers, red squirrels, hawks etc. Apparently there are hedgehogs too, but no porcupines. I wonder why there are no urban foxes?

Friday, 20 April 2007

For those who appreciated the installation art that is "Fort Chicken" the full gallery with descriptions is now available to view on the "Yeti in Italy" blog. Please visit if you can - my son is desparate for feedback :)) Thanks!

Thursday, 19 April 2007

Yep, we were just about to go out, when Alex noticed this walking across the lawn! Bizarrely it is the second time in my life a tortoise has just walked into it! I was about 11 last time - same as my son. Obviously some kind of weird family thing going on!

We checked with the gardener and the porter here and they told us we could take him back to our place. Now they know we have him, if anyone else in the Garden is looking for him they will be able to come and get him. But for now he is ours! Not surprisingly we didn't go out! This pre-historic monster has completely captured my kids imagination.

We've decided he can live in the shower at night and the kitchen while we are out. I'm not about to start drilling into his shell or anything - he definitely has a name scratched on his back, so he belongs or belonged to someone here. I can't leave him to roam in the garden unattended as the gardener would be pulling bits out of his mower for weeks!!

I know you can't get them easily in the UK anymore, wonder if it is the same here? If so he is also quite valuable, so I don't want him vanishing just yet!

My son had wanted a turtle from the Lent Market - this is much better :))

Wednesday, 18 April 2007

We had some friends over from the UK. What does everyone want to eat in Italy? Pizza and ice-cream! We did the ice-cream too, but that is even messier than this.....!

It was a friend of my son's and his mum. We had a great time as Alex hasn't mixed with his own age group too much while we have been here. Also we have decided to keep him here in Italy until September. He should have gone back to school tomorrow! He is ambivalent - he wanted to see his mates, board and play cricket - things that are in short supply out here!

We are starting to look at activities he can do now he is staying, plus the schoolwork is increasing as school is keen for him to not miss out on too much work. I think life is going to be pretty busy for the next 5 months!!

Hope you like all the pictures! I realise anyone reading this will get this one first - scroll down, please!

It was loud and quite scarey - that was just the crowd! Done it once, maybe again. If you are claustrophobic avoid unless you can get a view from a balcony somewhere. This was my camera's view, not mine!!

Tuesday, 3 April 2007

Wow! I can't believe it has been so long since my last post. But then we have been very busy here.

My niece finally arrived and brought with her the coldest weather in months! I think she has returned home believing she lives in the warmer country! It was lovely to see her. I don't know her as well as my other nieces and nephew as she is the youngest. In a way that helped as I didn't have to be her best friend, much more an auntie. She got on really well with my son and they spent a couple of days out on their own getting lost! Luckily Florence is small enough that you are never too far from where you want to be.

I asked her to bring a tin of baked beans, a jar of Hellman's mayo and some anti-erspirant.What I got was 9 tins of beans, 2 jars of mayo and 6 anti-perspirants! I was very happy with this stash!

My daughter turned 3 on the 29th March. She got the pinkest bike in the world courtesy of Winx - think fairy Brat dolls and you aren't far off! I will post a picture but as usual I am behind on downloading my photo's!

My husband took son and niece ski-ing to Abetone. They had the most snow in one day they have had all season. Visibility was atrocious and they ended up bum-boarding for the day - after they had snowchained the car and got back up to the village car park. It sounded like an adventure but one I am glad Antonia and I weren't involved in!

The weekend saw the weather improve and on the Saturday we held an Egg Hunt for the Toddler Group we go to in our garden. I provided the garden, the group provided the eggs! We also doubled it as Antonia's birthday party. She picked the world's biggest jam tart as her cake! Not surprisingly all the kids loved it and there was very little left. The turn out was really good and it was great to meet new people. Everyone brought a dish. Hoping I wouldn't have to make any tea was shortlived as all the food was great and vanished really quickly. We had some great chocolate chip cookies and little savoury tarts filled with tuna and black olive, pizza, quiche, biscuits, everything you can think of. I like the way you can buy from the bakeries here and know you are getting quality, edible food.

I'm hoping that this time the good weather is going to stay. Anyway, off to catch some rays just in case!